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Animal Industry = Animal Abuse

The cows at the ranch across the road were lowing mournfully again last night. Possibly because their calves were taken from them and shipped off to slaughter. Or maybe because they are stuck out in a half-flooded field while the tail-end of a typhoon dumps on them for the fourth straight day.

As is typical in this modern era, although his is a very small operation, the rancher has a building for his machinery, but the animals have to endure hypothermic weather conditions. Meanwhile, their “owner” sits inside an electrically-heated house, thinking only about what the blue, glowing boob tube tells him to.

And they call cows “dumb animals.”

I’ve always felt sorry for cows. Dehorned, defenseless and fenced into squared off, undersized pastures by barbed wire; they’re lucky if they can find a scraggly lone tree to take shelter under during winter storms or hot summer days. Domestic cattle in North America are not adapted to the interminably wet or subzero conditions they are expected to endure here.

And don’t even get me started on sheep. Talk about defenseless. Sheep ranchers have seen to it over the centuries that sheep are at their mercy, or the mercy of any other predatory species that comes along for that matter. And if said predator is non-human, the ranchers bring out their guns, traps and poisons to put the hurt on them as well.